TO ALL FPC MEMBERS
December Training Re-cap:
Although weather certainly wasn’t the best on Saturday; Sunday was a perfect day to be training our pups. Some of our winter guests have started to arrive: Welcome back Mr. & Mrs. Jim Scheffner, Joe Wadleigh, Mr. & Mrs. Ron Cass. We have a nice variety of puppies at training days right now; Small Munsterlander, wirehairs, DK’s, Griffs, and shorthairs and I hear another Gordon Setter coming soon. VERY exciting! The response from handlers at the snake clinic was very positive and they were grateful to the club for creating the opportunity to help their pet learn about snake scent being bad news… Big thanks to Steve Dickinson, Taylor Davenport and Evan Herndon, Jim and Carole Scheffner, Bret Sapp, Daniel Pritchard and all others who supported the event. The icing on the cake so to speak was I know of at least 6 dogs that ran last year that avoided the snakes all together appearing to have remembered the lesson from one year ago, It continues to prove to me this is a valuable training tool/service.
SPRING TEST
The spring test is rapidly approaching and more than 1/2 full. Don’t get bumped to the waiting list; get your entries in.
2018 TRAINING
Training dates for January are 6-7th and also 20-21st. The 2018 training calendar will be posted to website soon. The training day format will change to attempt to make training more organized and beneficial to all. My past focus has been puppies and new members. My new focus will be with older dogs to teach the water work, get the group pointed in the correct direction to have a finished gun dog. We will split into 2 groups: Group 1 will be puppies to 16 months and every month pups will work on gun sensitivity, pointing, tracking, field search, swimming. All puppy swim will be on the small puppy pond on Field A. Group 2 will be all others. The big pond will be utilized for duck search, steadiness drills for older dogs. The club has purchased 2 six-dog stake outs to be used with each group so handlers can stake out their dog and have more hands on experience. We have also added 2 more remote launchers and 2 pigeon harnesses. One point I would like to stress is the importance of yard work. To get a completed gun dog in reasonable time, basic yard work should be accomplished at home so that your dog is ready for more field work on training weekend. That being said , it does not mean you can’t run through some drills at training as well if need be. We are going to implement this format for Saturday to mid-day and then if field space is available it would be go pick a spot and have fun. Sunday will be pick a spot as well.
Happy Holidays! See you January 6th and 7th for Training
Bill Snyder & FPC of Navhda Board
2018 training Dates
January 6-7
20-21
March. 3-4. Mock test
10-11 TEST
April. 14-15
May. 5-6
June. 9-10
July. 14-15
August. 11-12
Sept. 8-9
Oct. 13-14
27-28 Mock Test
Nov. 10-11 TEST
Dec. 8-9
Chapter Sponsors:
Visit: www.floridapalmettonavhda.org for more information